Did you notice who David had been “striking down” in that
first verse? The Amalekites, the very
people Saul was intended to destroy but who were still occupying the attention
of Israel. David was finishing the work
Saul failed to complete. Who is the man
who comes to David with Saul’s crown and armlet, claiming to have killed Saul,
whom he assumes is David’s enemy and therefore expects to receive praise and honor
for having done? An Amalekite. David asks who this man is and he says, “I am
the son of a sojourner, an Amalekite.” Sojourners in the land were to be
treated like natives, they had the same rights and they were subject to the
same law. David sizes up the situation and
executes capital punishment against the man for murder. Saul’s failure to utterly destroy the
Amalekites comes around to David’s responsibility to finish the work.
No one doubts what Jesus is doing and saying. Their questions show us that. Where did He get this wisdom and the power to
do mighty works? Their problem is that
what they see doesn’t fit with what they know.
They know Jesus’ family, they know this man who had lived among them all
these years, and now it makes no sense that He is doing and saying these
things. Sometimes what we know is a
barrier to knowing. Our preconceptions
form a barrier against assimilating new information and properly understanding
it. our experience can do the same. If I have never seen someone miraculously
healed, I will either not believe it is possible or I will come up with an
alternative explanation for healing when it happens. The people who have “known” Jesus longest
cannot come to grips with all they see and hear because it doesn’t fit with
what they have known of Him before this time.
If we think of Jesus as a great moral and ethical teacher, we will not
believe in the miraculous things He did nor His claims to equality with
God. The disciples believed that He had
the power and authority to send them out to do great things and proclaim the
kingdom. They only knew what they had
seen and heard and that was enough to believe and not be offended.
The Jerusalem leadership made a good decision to send Judas and
Silas to Antioch with Paul and Barnabas.
These men represented the council and thus validated the contents of the
missive sent with them. Their presence
meant that this was indeed the word of the leaders on the matter of the Gentile
converts and the Law. The authority of the
letter couldn’t be questioned. If they
had not come to do so, the church at Antioch would have accepted the letter but
there would have been a continuing controversy because those outside the church
would have questioned the veracity of the letter. Our authority always needs to be verified,
teachers should teach according to the Word of God rather than their own
teaching. We always need to discern the
Spirits.
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